


Not Worth It (Come Save Me)

by MoonlightBreeze



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alec Lightwood Deserves Nice Things, Alec Lightwood Feels, Alec Lightwood Has Self-Worth Issues, Alec Lightwood Needs A Hug, Alec Lightwood-centric, Angst, Background Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood, Bad Parent Maryse Lightwood, Bad Parent Robert Lightwood, Cutting, Emotional Hurt, Episode: s01e09 Rise Up, Gen, Guilt, Heavy Angst, Hurt Alec Lightwood, Hurt No Comfort, I do NOT give him the nice things, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Internalized Homophobia, Major Character Injury, Parabatai Bond, Punching, Repression, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Suicide, Tags Are Hard, and now on to the v serious tags, he does not get the hug, like big time, no beta we die like men, please note the MCD warning above
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:47:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24768763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MoonlightBreeze/pseuds/MoonlightBreeze
Summary: After Jace and Alec fight in 1x09, Alec makes a drastic decision.Please mind the tags and read my author's note for trigger warnings! No happy ending.
Relationships: Alec Lightwood & Isabelle Lightwood, Alec Lightwood & Isabelle Lightwood & Jace Wayland, Alec Lightwood & Jace Wayland, Alec Lightwood & himself, Lydia Branwell & Alec Lightwood, Magnus Bane & Alec Lightwood, again briefly - Relationship, just briefly - Relationship
Comments: 22
Kudos: 144
Collections: Fluff vs. Angst Battle 2020, Pls kill me





	Not Worth It (Come Save Me)

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, guys! I'm rewatching Shadowhunters currently (who's surprised?) and I recently watched the scene in 1x09 where Jace and Alec fight. It gave me feelings, and somehow this was born. I have no control. Also, I'm sorry if I break your heart with this. Feel free to scream at me in the comments for it. 
> 
> WARNING: This fic contains a _lot_ of potentially triggering things. Please see below for a complete list of content warnings, or read my tags. Keep yourselves safe, you lovely humans. <3
> 
> I really hope you like this! Kudos make my day, and comments validate my existence, so please feel free to leave those, if you want :) And as always, I hope you have a wonderful day/night!
> 
> ~ Em
> 
> Content warnings: Self-harm (by punching and cutting), self-hatred, implied/referenced emotional child abuse, internalized homophobia, mentions of blood, no happy ending, major character death, suicide. Please stay safe. <3

Alec threw another punch to the bag in front of him, ignoring his knuckles as they split. He could still feel the lingering ache in his sides from Jace’s blows earlier and the echoes of Jace’s pain from his own hits. The fact that parabatai could feel each other’s pain meant that every bruising jab that he had landed on Jace reflected back in purples and blues on him. Alec was used to pain bringing with it relief, but the throb of Jace’s wounds left him feeling empty and hollow. 

“Alec!” Lydia stood in the doorway to the training room, clutching a file in her hands and wearing a worried look, veiled poorly by an irritated scowl. “There you are. I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” She walked in and raised the file in her hands in his general direction. “We need to discuss what happened at the City of Bones, and I need you to fill out an official report.”

“Not right now,” Alec gritted out through his teeth, hitting the punching bag again. He ignored the way Lydia’s eyes widened in surprise when she saw that he hadn’t wrapped his hands. “I’ll do it tomorrow.”

Lydia hesitated. She looked concerned, especially when she noticed that he was punching with his injured arm. He was sure that red must have seeped through the bandage by now, but he couldn’t be bothered to care. 

“Alec, I really need - ”

“I said, not right now!” Alec shouted, whirling around to face her. His eyes were stinging, though he couldn’t tell if it was from sweat or tears, and he just wanted her to _leave_. 

Lydia took a step back, her eyes flashing with some unidentifiable emotion. “Okay,” she muttered, more to herself than to Alec. “I’ll leave you alone now.” With that, she turned on her heel and fled, shutting the door behind her with perhaps more force than strictly necessary.

Alec’s shoulders sagged with relief the minute she was gone, and he closed his eyes, resting his forehead on the punching bag. He was tired in a way that had nothing to do with lack of sleep.

He was angry; of course, he was angry. He was following the Law. He was doing what needed to be done, and his siblings had conspired behind his back to make sure he couldn’t carry out his orders. They had betrayed him. 

The thought made tears rise to his eyes, and he admitted to himself with a sigh of defeat that he was more hurt than anything else. Unrelentingly, inconceivably hurt. 

He had practically raised his siblings, both of them. His parents were in Idris so often that they rarely saw their children, and Alec was forced to take on the role that should have been theirs from a very young age. When Izzy had nightmares as a child, she didn’t climb into her parents’ bed for comfort; no, she climbed into _Alec’s_. When Jace remembered Michael Wayland with a little too much clarity, he didn’t seek out Robert or Maryse to talk about it with; no, he sought out _Alec_. 

Alec had done his best to make sure his siblings were happy and never felt the way he felt. He had given everything for them, done everything he possibly could to just be a good big brother. And he still wasn’t. He wasn’t good enough. He was _never_ good enough.

Memories from his childhood rushed in without his permission; his mother, sending him to his room without dinner for missing a single rune on the exam. He remembered pleading with her, reminding her that he had almost gotten a perfect score. And she had snapped at him, told him that almost wasn’t perfect, that almost would never be good enough. 

He remembered his father, telling him that if he ever wanted to be an Institute Head, he needed to be top of his class at the Academy, the best archer in the entire Shadow World. He heard his father’s voice in his head, years later, telling him that he still wasn’t the best, that he needed to work harder, train faster, do more, be _enough_. 

He remembered himself, clutching his bow so tightly it left grooves between his fingers and practicing in the training room until well after midnight. He remembered shooting arrows until his hands were raw and bleeding. 

His entire life, Alec had tried and tried to be good enough. For his parents, for his siblings, for _anyone_. And he had failed. Every. Single. Time. 

Alec threw his fist into the punching bag with abandon, paying no mind to the wet smears that stained the bag in its wake. The controlled, self-inflicted pain brought with it a sense of relief so profound that he could cry. It was what he deserved; it was punishment. For not being enough, for not being the man everyone wanted him to be, for hurting Jace. 

A wave of nausea rolled through him as he remembered their fight; he had started it. 

He hadn’t meant to; as much as Jace frustrated and annoyed him sometimes, he never wanted to hurt him. Jace was his parabatai. But when he had said that, nearly uttered those poisonous words, Alec was on his feet and punching before Jace even had a chance to finish his sentence. He didn’t think; he just reacted. 

He couldn’t let Jace say those words. The knowledge was bad enough. If he said them, it would make it real. It would make it _all_ real. All of the shameful thoughts, the sick, twisted desires that Alec kept locked up inside himself. He couldn’t bear it. Having his weakness aired to the world like that would open him up in ways he’d never been before, ways he _couldn’t_ be. Of all of the things he’d sworn to protect, his secret was the most daunting of them all.

Alec threw another punch to the bag, relishing in the way his knuckles tore and left crimson stains behind on it. He couldn’t remember fucking things up so royally in his entire life. He had, somehow, even through years of love and devotion, managed to end up on the wrong side of his siblings. He was getting married, to a woman, and he was the eldest son of two ex-Circle members. Even with Lydia’s help, he would never get to run an Institute. 

Even if they managed to work things out, Alec had pulled a blade on his parabatai. That memory would be burned into his mind forever. He hit the bag again. He didn’t think he’d ever felt self-loathing quite this sharp. He hated himself. He hated himself more than Clary, more than Valentine, more than _anybody_. The fury ran deeper than his bones; it pervaded his entire being.

It was this thought, perhaps, that made Alec abandon the punching bag and reach for a seraph blade.

He turned it over and over in his bloody, abused hands, noticing the way it caught the light and gleamed in his grasp. It was bright, beautiful, brilliant; everything he was not.

It was then that the dam broke. 

Alec took the blade and shoved its point towards his wrists. The ache in his hands had helped, for a little bit, but it wasn’t enough. It would never be enough. The pain that Alec gave to himself would never be enough of a retribution for all of the pain he caused others, unless he did this. Unless he took the blade and carved everything that was bad and awful and wrong out of him until there was nothing left. 

The splitting, agonizing pain made tears rise to Alec’s eyes, but he refused to let them fall. Crying was a sign of weakness, and he was not weak. Not anymore. This, removing himself from the equation when he was no longer needed, no longer wanted, this was strength. 

Alec barely noticed the crimson spilling from his wrist or the way the room swayed and his vision went black. He was too focused on the pain, on allowing himself to feel it and _know_ that this was the last time he would have to pay the price for his misdeeds, for the wrong steps he seemed to keep taking. After this, it would finally be over.

That thought filled him with so much relief that the tears he’d been trying to hold back earlier spilled down his cheeks in macabre, traitorous lines. Vaguely, he heard a clank as the seraph blade slipped from his hands and fell to the ground. The Institute’s ceiling tiles swam before his eyes, and he wondered when exactly he’d fallen to the floor. His head felt fuzzy and numbness began to invade his senses. It felt like coming home. 

A thought skittered across Alec’s mind before he had time to stop it, and it made him feel the slightest twinge of hesitation for the first time that night. 

It was a thought of eyes, of glittering, golden cat’s eyes ringed with shimmery blue eye makeup. For just a minute, a small, selfish part of Alec wished that the owner of those eyes would come for him, pull him from his knees and heal him, tell him that he was worth it. 

But this was life, not a movie, and Alec was a Shadowhunter, not a mundane. It was a cold, harsh truth that hurt and caused more tears to pour from his rapidly-dulling blue eyes, but it was a truth nonetheless. 

No one was coming to save him.

**Author's Note:**

> [Stalk me on Tumblr](http://moonlight-breeze-44.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Prompts are open!
> 
> Want to embrace your inner chaotic fandom participant? Require somewhere to scream about Shadowhunters and other fandoms? Need writing advice, encouragement, or new friends? [Join our Discord server](https://discord.gg/82pvdE39fD) and find your place in a community of fandom-ers livin' it up! We welcome everyone, and we would love to have you. <3


End file.
